Политическая система государства

Plan:
1. Introduction.
2. The main part:
a) a system of power - what is it ?
b) the political system of Great Britain;
c) the comparison of British and Ukrainian political systems.
3. Summary.
Introduction
The State System of any nation is not an artificial creation of some
genius or simply the embodiment of different rational schemes. It is
nothing else but a work of many centuries, a product of a national spirit,
a political mentality and the consciousness of people.
I have chosen the topic because of its obvious importance. Ukraine is
building a sovereign state and it is encounteing a lot of problems. Ukraine
is suffering an overall deep crisis, trying to set herself free from the
persistent inheritance of totalitarianism preying upon economic, politic,
national self-consciousness. There is no universally efficient remedy to
help the Ukrainian society out of this grave condition. The process of
recovery will be long and arduous. Moreover, the country’s eventual
deliverance from totalitarian inheritance and its harmonious entry into
civilized world community remain for that matter, hardly practicable at
all, unless political culture is humanized, and political education of such
a kind propagated that would help society overcome the backwardness, the
pre-modernity of prevailing visions of justice, democracy, law and order,
and the relationship of the individual and the state.
It is quite clear that in the process of democracy formation a lot of
problems connected with it will inevitably appear. Many of them already
exist. In this solution, a considered usage of foreign experience can help
the Ukrainian community to optimize the processes essential for the
transitional period from one political system to another, and not to allow
the social prevailing tensions to develop into a national civil crisis. And
it will also help to save time and resources.
The Main Part.
A system of power is a complex of organically connected and bonded
together governmental bodies, establishments and persons given the highest
authority, and also political parties and organizations, directly having
the power and putting it into life. The sources of power in a
democratically organized community are its people, and its system. First of
all, key figures within this structure should be under control of the
people. This system is the core of legal functioning and serves as the
foundation of state and public life. Its main parts are legislative and
executive power.
If we want finally to live as normal people, we should seriously think
which system of power we subject to and how is it possible to improve it,
how to make it suitable for the interests of our people and what can be
taken from foreign, world experience. But one of the main problems is that
we are not the only ones, who don’t have a good system of modern power.
Humanity hasn’t yet worked out a suitable and ideal system. That is why we
should build our own power by considering all positive and negative aspects
of the world’s system and our one. But we should not forget that a power
works well only when its authority is clearly and definitely determined.
Let’s compare our system of power with the British one to see whether it is
competent enough and how well organized it is.
The Political System Of England
The organs of goverment in the United Kingdom of Great Britian are:
1) the legislature, which consists of the Queen in Parliament, and is
the supreme authority of the realm;
2) the executive, wich consist of:
c) the Cabinet and other ministers of the Crown, who are
responsible for initiating and directing national policy;
d) Government departments, most of them under the control of
ministers, and all staffed by civil servants, who are
responsible for administration at the national level;
e) local authorities, who administer and manage many services at
the local level;
f) statutory boards, which are responsible for the operation of
particular nationalized industries or public services;
g) “shadow cabinet” which is the directing and leading body of
the oppositional group.
The most interesting and important aspect of the British political
system, its pecularity, lies in its division of powers.
It is common knowledge that Great Britain, having the oldest Parliament
in the world, has one of the most stable and effective political regimes of
our time. Its stability is mostly the result of the division of powers,
which, by the the way, is not the exeption from the general rule.
The main idea of this variant lies in the following: the principle of the
demarcation (division) is combined with a principle of interaction. And its
principle is fixed in the British system of power not as something
abstract, but institutionally. I mean a special center, a linking section,
which brings together the legislating and executing powers, and at the same
time is the center of making important political decisions. Surely, it is
the Cabinet and its leader which are at the head of the whole executive
system of the state.
The main 4 principles of division of powers are:
1) sovereignty of the Parliament, as the highest body of
political management;
2) the leading role of the Cabinet and the government in the
legislative process;
3) a strict Parliamentary and commitee control of the legislative
branch;
4) a special role given to the State Machinery, which not only
executes the instructions, but also influences a political
process.
So, as we see, the legislators provide the execution of the laws and
resolutions of the Parliament by controlling the State machinery, and in
its turn, the state machinery participates in the legislative process,
providing its preparatory stage (by doing a spade-work).
British Parliament.
The Comparison Of Two Political Systems:
Ukrainian And British Ones.
1. The first distinction may seem to be the form of rule:
Ukraine is a respublic. And Britain, as you probably know, is considered
to be a parliamentary monarchy.
The Queen is the personification of the U.K. By law, she is the head of
the executive branch, an integral part of the legislature, the head of the
judiciary, the commander-in-chief of all armed forces of the Crown and the
temporal head of the established Church of England. But in practice, as a
result of a long evolutionary process, these powers have changed. Today,
the queen acts only on the advice of her Ministers which she cannot
constitutionally ignore. In fact she reigns but she doesn’t rule.
However, the monarchy has a good deal more power than is commonly
supposed. There remain certain discretionary powers in the hands of the
monarch, known as the Royal Prerogative.
2. The Ukrainian and the British Parliaments have at least four similar
functions:
a) to work out legislation, including the creation of a budget;
b) to control the government;
c) to represent and respond to public opinion;
d) to influence actively the people by acquainting them openly
with the facts, concerning the accepted desisions.
The difference lies in the electoral systems and the rules for recalling
the government.
But there is also one more remarkable peculiarity of the Ukrainian
Parliament: the political history of Ukraine does not know any potent
legislative bodies (we can hardly take into account the experience of the
Soviet Congress ).
3. Both Ukraine and Britain are countries with the representative
democracy (which means that the people delegate power to the bodies, which
act on their behalf).
The difference is, that Britain has a parliamentary form of government,
and Ukraine, in its turn, has a so-called “semi-presidential” form. The
main distinctions of this forms are shown in the table, given below.
|The British parliamentary form |The Ukrainian “semi-pesidential” |
| |form |
|1. The election solves two |1. The election solves just one |
|questions: |question: |
|On one hand, the forming of the |Either the problem of forming the |
|Parliament. And on the other hand,|Parliament or the creation of the |
|the creation of the Government and|Government. |
|different coalitions. | |
|2. The Government is formed only |2. The Government is formed by |
|by the Parliament. |both the President and the |
| |Parliament. |
|3. The executive Power is |3. The executive Power is not |
|separated. |separated. |
4. Unlike Britain, Ukraine has different bodies of legislative and
executive power, and one body doesn’t interfere with the activity of the
other.
5. The negative features of the British system may seem to be too much
power in the hands of Prime Minister and rather uncontrolled local
government.
Summary
Having compared two political systems, I have come to the conclusion that
the form and the level of development of the systems are influenced greatly
by the history of the State. The second factor is that of evaluationary
progress, which usually improves the existing order and makes it more
democratic.
Having analysed two state systems, I have noticed the tendency towards
the reinforcement of the executive power and a lessening of the legislative
power. But still, parliament remains an integral institution in a
democratic society.
I have studied the British political experience concerning the division
of powers and I can say that with all its originality, the British System
is not something unique or exceptional. This system should be taken as the
foundation stone of the cooperation of two powers in countries with a
representative democracy.
The reason for the lasting discussion of this problem in the Ukrainian
Parliament lies not only in involving the interests of powerful persons.
Actually, it is the result of the “amateur” level to understand this
problem.
A list of used literature:
1. Основи держави і права України, 1993
2. M.Y.Mezey Comparative Legislatures, Durham, 1979
3. Политические исследования, Полис, 1992
4. П.О.Бех Англійська мова, Либідь, 1992
5. A book of Britain, Просвещение, 1977
6. Деловая жизнь // Правда, 1991
7. Entony Sempson Anatomy of Britain, 1992
8. Мировая экономика и международные отношения, Наука, 1993